“Not at all.”
Her companion greeted him with her usual civility and composure and took her place beside Georgiana. Some light conversation followed. Georgiana had been practising the pianoforte before breakfast and feared she had done little justice to a passage she meant to improve, while Mrs Annesley spoke of a call expected later in the day. Darcy answered as was proper, but with very distracted attention. Georgiana, whose diffidence by no means excluded observation where those she loved were concerned, glanced at him more than once.
“You have received something of consequence,” she said at last, looking at his correspondence with cautious curiosity. “I hope it is nothing disagreeable.”
Darcy looked down at the letters before him, then at the one which lay nearest his hand. “No, nothing disagreeable,” he said. “Only unexpected.”
Georgiana seemed satisfied with that and asked no more. He was grateful for it. Though there was nothing in the letter that she might not know in time, the mention of Wickham still had the power to wound her. Until he had decided how to act, he wished for no discussion, however gentle.
The remainder of breakfast passed without incident. Yet even while Georgiana spoke of a new piece of music sent by her master and Mrs Annesleyrecommended a shawl merchant of particular merit, Darcy’s thoughts remained divided between the women before him and the letter beside his hand.
What might be done by yourself could not be achieved by anyone else.
It was not intended as a compliment, only as a statement of the truth. She asked him to do what only he could do. Not because he was wealthier than others. Not because his rank commanded blind obedience. But because he knew Wickham as few men living did, and because his word, once given, could not lightly be dismissed.
There lay the true difficulty.
To speak to Wickham’s officers would be to attach his own name, fully and deliberately, to an account he had hitherto revealed only in confidence. No honourable man did such a thing carelessly. If he went forward, he must be prepared to state enough to make the warning effective. He must endure questions, perhaps even disbelief, from men whose judgement he neither knew nor particularly esteemed. He must also accept that Wickham, driven into a corner, might turn more vicious than before.
Darcy considered all this without shrinking from it, yet neither did he underestimate it.
There had always been a part of him, and not, he thought, the least reasonable part, which recoiled from giving Wickham one moment moreconsequence in his life than necessity demanded. To be obliged to pursue the man through yet another scene of explanation and disgrace was repugnant to him.
And yet, what was the alternative?
To do nothing was itself a choice.
To fold Elizabeth’s letter away, commend her prudence to himself, and wait in the hope that Wickham might somehow be contained by the ordinary workings of society would now be a decision made in full knowledge. Worse, it would be a decision made after she had asked for his help.
Darcy stood very still. That consideration ended the struggle more than all the rest put together.
Had the request come from a nervous parent, an officious neighbour, or some alarmed acquaintance eager to embroil him in village scandal, he might have refused without self-reproach. Had it come from a mind less steady, he might have judged patience preferable to action. But Elizabeth Bennet had not written from weakness. She had written after trying what could be tried. She had measured the danger, found her own influence insufficient, and turned to him because she believed he would not fail where duty was plain.
To disappoint that belief would be unworthy.
The conviction settled in him with the calm force of something which, once clearly seen, admitted no further debate. He would act. He could not do otherwise when Elizabeth Bennet had asked for his help.
There were inquiries to be made, names to be confirmed, and a letter or two to be written before he chose the most effective course of proceeding with Colonel Forster or whoever else held proper authority over Wickham’s conduct. He would not move blindly. But move he would.
Darcy stood up. “Excuse me, Georgiana, Mrs Annesley. I believe I must go to my study now.”
Georgiana looked at him with quiet interest. “You are going to be busy today?”
“Yes.”
“I hope,” she said after a slight pause, “that it is something which will not distress you too much.”
Darcy’s expression softened. “I hope it may have the opposite effect in the end.”
She smiled at that, though she could not understand it.
When he had closeted himself in his study and sent off the first notes to bring his agents to the house for their instructions, Darcy took the letter up once more. For a moment he looked at the page not as evidence, nor as a call to action, but simply assomething written by her. The hand was firm. The language was careful. Every line reflected the same union of sense and feeling that had distinguished her in his thoughts long before he wished it to do so.
He folded it and placed it inside his pocketbook. There was work to be done.
But as he left the breakfast room, one thought accompanied him with a steadiness as real as his purpose: whatever the outcome of the business itself, Elizabeth Bennet had trusted him, and he would prove himself deserving of it.
Chapter 13
